


mutuality

by viscrael



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: (kind of), Canon Compliant, Established Relationship, Fluff, M/M, Trans Male Character, bc im the worst and cant go 2 seconds w/o including a trans hc lmao, slight angst? only slight, trans man mccree
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-12
Updated: 2017-02-12
Packaged: 2018-09-23 18:34:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,316
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9671021
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/viscrael/pseuds/viscrael
Summary: “You are aware of the dangers of working with Overwatch.”Hanzo has a scar on his right cheek. Jesse notices it as he says, “I’m not gonna take that as an excuse for bein’ pointlessly reckless, if that’s where you’re goin’ with this.”





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [taythebee](https://archiveofourown.org/users/taythebee/gifts).



> this is gay and self indulgent. also, its 4 am and unedited af. double also i wrote this for a friend in exchange for a pharmercy fic bc im horrible lmao 
> 
> @tay enjoy ur cowboy arhcer bfs

“I do not need you to protect me.”

Hanzo says it while they’re getting in the communal showers. It’s casual, unrelated to anything that they were talking about before, and spoken into silence—but Jesse knows what it’s in reference to. He busies himself with getting undressed, unbuttoning his shirt slowly. He can feel Hanzo’s eyes on the back of his head, knows he’s being watched; still, he doesn’t turn around. When he peels his shirt off, it sticks to his skin with dried blood. He winces, and behind him, Hanzo turns on a faucet.

Now there’s only Jesse’s pointed silence, and the water.

“McCree,” Hanzo says. “Are you listening?”

“Yeah, I’m listenin’.” Jesse finally turns around, although he preoccupies himself with turning his own faucet on. He still isn’t looking at Hanzo, although that part might have something to do with them both showering right now. Hanzo’s no sight for sore eyes, after all.

“Then you understand—“

“That you don’t want me protectin’ you, I got that,” Jesse says. “The part I don’t understand is why you’re so up ‘n arms about me lettin’ you die.”

“My life was not in danger—“

“I don’t need a sniper that’s unconscious or in too much pain to shoot correctly,” Jesse snaps. He doesn’t mean to snap. He slicks his hair back from his eyes, drenched now. The water’s lukewarm at best by this point in the day. At Gibraltar, if you want a pleasant shower, you take one first thing in the morning before anyone else is up. Late at night, after a mission’s gone sour and you’re still covered in blood, you don’t get warm water.

“I would not have been unable to do my job correctly, had I been hurt,” Hanzo says, much quieter now. He sounds like he’s getting tired of having this argument. Good. Jesse is too.

“You ever thought that maybe I just don’t like the thought of you gettin’ injured?”

When Jesse finally looks over, Hanzo’s eyes are closed under the spray of his own shower head, water running down his bare chest. The tattoos on his left arm seem to glow, and without Hanzo there to stare back at him pointedly, Jesse lets himself really look at the tattoos, detailed and intricate and beautiful. He watches the flex in Hanzo’s muscle when he reaches for his shampoo, the curve of the dragon’s body around his shoulder and biceps and down his wrist.

“You are aware of the dangers of working with Overwatch.” Hanzo opens his eyes finally, and they find Jesse’s easily, holding his gaze. The two have only been back from their mission for an hour at most, and it shows in Hanzo’s expression, in the tired way he regards Jesse, the bags under his eyes and healing scrapes on his body. There are no serious injuries—something that wouldn’t be possible if it weren’t for Jesse—but his pile of clothes sitting a few feet away is stained in red, and it’s hard to tell if that’s his own blood or someone else’s. Even still, he’s beautiful, in an ethereal, intimidating sort of way.

Hanzo has a scar on his right cheek. Jesse notices it as he says, “I’m not gonna take that as an excuse for bein’ pointlessly reckless, if that’s where you’re goin’ with this.”

The silence in answer proves that that had, indeed, been where Hanzo was going with this. Jesse grins wryly and reaches for a bar of soap. From the corner of his eye, he can see Hanzo watching his movements with sharp, analytical eyes.

“Somethin’ on my face? Or am I just that good lookin’?”

He’s joking, trying to make the mood lighter. If Jesse had it his way, they wouldn’t be talking about this, wouldn’t be pushing the subject or making the wound deeper. Hanzo had been—really pissed off during the mission, when Jesse had taken a shot for him. And Jesse, already sporting a bullet wound, hadn’t really understood why _he_ was the one Hanzo was angry with. Angela healed Jesse the moment all the threats were eliminated, but Hanzo’s anger hadn’t quite settled so easily.

To his surprise, though, there are hands on his back, cold and slender, sliding around to rest on his hips, and he tenses under the sudden touch. Hanzo’s beard tickles his skin between his shoulder blades, a face pressed into his back softly.

“The latter,” Hanzo says. It’s spoken softly. Jesse lets his muscles relax and holds Hanzo’s hands, still settled on his hips. Hanzo is warm, much warmer than the water, and Jesse leans back into the warmth.

“Surprised you admitted that,” Jesse laughs gently. Hanzo nuzzles his face further into Jesse’s back as if in agreement.

“It did not…originally occur to me,” Hanzo says, “that…it was, possibly, only because you did not want me to get hurt.”

“Of course I wouldn’t want you gettin’ hurt. I care ‘bout you.” Jesse’s hand tightens around Hanzo’s. “Quite a lot, if you couldn’t tell already.”

“I am aware. You are not quiet about it.”

“Would you _want_ me to be quiet about it?”

“No.”

The quickness with which Hanzo answers makes Jesse laugh. He lets go of Hanzo’s hands, taking them off his hips and turning around so they’re facing each other. Water drips down Hanzo’s hair into his eyes; Jesse pushes his hair back softly, smiling.

“I knew it wasn’t gonna kill ya,” Jesse tells him. His hand lingers on the back of Hanzo’s neck. “You’re tougher than that. But that doesn’t mean I _like_ watchin’ you get hurt. If I could always take the blow for ya, I would.”

“That is not a very rational thing to wish.”

“Nothin’ about us is rational.”

Hanzo looks away. He moves a hand up to brush over the scar on Jesse’s abdomen from where Angela had healed his bullet wound. The hand lingers there, then moves slowly up Jesse’s chest, feeling along the other scars—small ones, from cuts and scrapes, and the larger ones, like the parallel, horizontal scars under Jesse’s chest, a permanent result of surgery from nearly fifteen years ago. People have recommended he heal those scars, try to get rid of them, but even if he could make them disappear completely, Jesse doesn’t think he’d want to. They’re too much a part of him; wishing they were gone or trying to get rid of them wouldn’t change why they’re there, wouldn’t change that part of himself or his history. Hanzo feels them now, not with disgust or curiosity, but with practiced ease. He’s done this hundreds of times by now, laying tangled together on Jesse’s couch or curled up in Hanzo’s bedroom.

“I would too,” Hanzo says, “if it were possible. I would…do the same for you.”

“Glad to know the feelin’ is mutual, then.” Jesse says its lightly, presses a kiss to Hanzo’s forehead when he’s done, but he’s vividly aware of the weight of Hanzo’s admission. Even though they’ve been—whatever they are, boyfriends or lovers or fuckbuddies or just friends-who-are-sort-of-more—for what feels like forever now, Hanzo doesn’t admit that there are…deeper feelings there very often. Jesse is more lenient with how often he confesses his own emotions, but Hanzo has always had more trouble with that, always been a little more guarded.

Hearing him say that he cares about Jesse, enough so that he would rather get hurt in Jesse’s place if possible—that’s monumental. But he tries to make it feel like it’s not, for Hanzo’s sake.

“So you’re done bein’ angry with me, then?”

Hanzo huffs like he’s offended, but he lets Jesse kiss him lightly. Grudgingly, he admits, “Yes. I think…I am finished.”

Jesse snickers. “Good. Let’s get washed up then, we can go back to my room afterwards?”

“You have no need to pose it as a question.”

 


End file.
